Monthly Archives: May 2014

Two days since I posted something of a diatribe about my inability to sleep well (or at all sometimes). I wish I could say things are better, but well, at least they aren’t any worse.

Last night I didn’t sleep much because the cold we’re fighting here was beating on the Boodle and the coughing keep waking him (and I) up. Not Dan… My husband seems capable of sleeping through anything.

I know who’s going to survive the zombie apocalypse in this house! 😀

Anyway, it’s been two days, and now here we are at Wednesday. Know what that means? It’s regular feature time… time for a ROW80 Check-in and a WIPpet.

What to do first, what to do first…

Well, the WIPpet, of course!

These past few weeks I’ve done my WIPpets in serial form so that each week followed directly on the prior week’s post. I’m doing the same thing this week, but next week I will be jumping ahead in this (not really called an) Unnamed Story to leave out the “naughty bits”. Or at least the more explicit bits than I’ve already posted….

She stood waiting for him to make the next move, though what that should be he had no clue. Anticipation fulled her posture as she stood there.

He demurred answering as he regained a place on the bed. As pleasurable as he sometimes found making love while standing, they were both tired. He felt exhausted.

And yet he wanted another taste of the sensuality that she’d shown him. He laid down, then waggled a finger to her, signaling that she should join him.

She slunk over. “Yes?” Her voice took on that nerve-wracking purr she used when she wanted something difficult, the purr that no man he’d met could ever resist.

Including him….

He couldn’t stop the sigh that escaped him. His gaze followed the line of her shoulder and neck, coming to rest on her face, even as his fingers touched her waist and began running up her side to the curve of her breast, then over her shoulder to her chin. Drawing her down to kiss, he whispered, “Name it, Atyr. What do you want of me? Name it. It’s yours.”

She blinked and eased back. “Mm? What do you mean by that, ‘Listii? I want nothing more than you do right now.”

He couldn’t stop the smile that pressed forth any more than the sigh. “And that would be, little Atyr?” He brushed her lips with his once more. “Beautiful Mouse?”

If anyone does wish to read the missing section, please contact me directly regarding the piece at mouse (at) sff (dot) net. Fair warning… I’d really like a critique on the piece, as in do you find the piece “over the top”, “believable”, etc. I wrote this scene after reading and trying a few exercises from Susie Bright’s How to Write a Dirty Story (amazon link, but I get nothing for posting). It would be great to know if I made it work.

K.L. Schwengel at My Random Muse, fearlessly leads the #WIPpet where writers post pieces of a draft (Work In Progress) that somehow relate with the date for fun and discussion. Feel free to comment and visit other #WIPpeteers here. We love the company.

And now a short and sweet…

ROW80 Check-in

I wrote some new words yesterday. Yeah, this is a big deal to me. They weren’t just me trying to force words to the page; these words flowed. I didn’t get my ROW80 sponsor duties done. In fact, most any blogging or checking-in I need to get done, I’m saving for Thursday afternoon. Sorry. Just finishing up the chaos that is May.

I have to say though, I’m really glad I continued with the Round of Words in 80 Days challenge this session. The nudge, gentle and yet as imminent as it has been, has kept the slow days from piling up. I’m learning how to honor my process and my needs (so that process works best) through steady participation in the ROW80. It’s truly become the Challenge That Knows You Have a Life for me… though it’s taken a while for me to understand that.

Has it been that for you? Have you gotten discouraged with the challenge only to leave, then return? What motivated you to join in? What stopped you? Inquiring minds (I almost wrote “inquiring Mimes” there… how’s that for a Freudian slip?) want to know!

PS: if anyone here reads erotica and would be willing to offer a critique on a piece of a sex scene, please read the WIPpet and contact me via email. I’d appreciate any and all help.

Right now, my head is spinning. Not sure why, though some of it is definitely sinus pressure.

Koala sleeping on a tree top (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

The rest is from the migraine I gave myself by messing with my sleep schedule. I stayed up late way too many nights this weekend. Thing is… I never feel “good” until around 3 or 4 in the afternoon, even on the best days. I stay up late because I’m finally in a comfortable space…. and the fact that I’m usually not sleepy until 2am or later.

Never mind that I can’t sleep later than 7am most days, even on those promised days of sleeping in.

Today, being Memorial Day and a day that I’m not expected to be anywhere , I not only slept in, but took a huge nap after waking for a bit. Bad idea, supposedly, and I’d be likely to agree given the way I feel right now.

Sleeping (Photo credit: Moyan_Brenn)

I’m at a loss, however, to change things. I’ve tried going to bed early and have laid up tossing and turning (or woken up in the middle hours not daring to get up because I’d disturb my husband). The “noise” (mentioned in the above link) always keeps me from settling, and though the “experts” would probably disagree… I’ve always slept better with blankets piled on me with the sun shining through an open window. Maybe it’s a radiant heat thing, because I can’t sleep in a closed up house with a furnace on as well. Cool air on the face and lots of blankets on the bod–that’s me!

I’d like to get Life and Sleep to work together a bit for me. I knew most of these Physical Effects of Sleep Deprivation before I read about them because I’ve lived most of them, and frankly, they all suck.

Thing is, I’m really at a loss. I’ve had sleep issues for nearly 40 years of my life, and I don’t even know where to start to fix things.

ROW80 Check-in

Sub-par… I’ve done almost no writing, little reading, just…. well, a lot of staring at a screen (not counting the weed pulling yesterday). And I feel like crud… I’m not sleeping right, thinking right, getting the things done I’d like to do….

It’s Wednesday and thus time for two of my favorite things: WIPpets and ROW80 Check-ins.* Let’s go first with a…

ROW80 Check-in

Status quo describes things since last Wednesday. While I (once again) did not make a Sunday post, I did get a post up on Monday…. not ROW80 related. Writing has been a bit less consistent, maintaining an every other day pace as opposed to daily, but I have also had twice the driving around, more than twice the school-related events, some medical, some family… May has been insanely busy and emotionally taxing.

Things have begun to settle… just in time for JuNoWriMo. I’m both looking forward to it and dreading it. I’m just not feeling the fire. I’m feeling weary and emotionally drained, and not at all in shape for any pre-WriMo prep.

Looks like I’m winging things this year.

WIPpet

Another brief piece today, two paragraphs (5 for the month – 2+1 for the date)… once again from (oh, heck, call it what it what I have for years) Phuque Ewe (also called the Unnamed Story).

Sometimes it feels like I’m dragging this along intentionally. I’m not…. though my characters are. Yes, this point of the story involves a sex scene, and yes, I have some trepidation about posting something so intimate online. However, that’s not why the scene seems full of prevarication and hesitance; it’s Atyr and ‘Listii . It is written this way to “show” how these two respond to each other (and the world) and not “tell”.

He smiled. “Never assume that a waif like you can keep me down, Atyr. Especially certain parts of me,” he added as his grip on her eased enough to let her drift toward his hips. Amused by the arousal she’d encouraged in him, he wondered if he might not support her there solely on tender touches and kisses.

If only, he thought as he let her slide to her feet before the uncomfortable downward pressure of her weight on him discouraged further thoughts of intimacy. Once she was standing in front of him, he finally finished ridding himself of his underwear and depositing it on the chair.

So a question… Should I post a larger snippet next week? Being the 28th, larger numbers are easy to come by.

And lastly, another song… one that fits this story so very, very well.

Led by K.L. Schwengel at My Random Muse, #WIPpet writers post pieces of a draft (Work In Progress) that somehow relate with the date for fun and discussion. Feel free to comment and visit other #WIPpeteers here. We love the company.

(*Disclaimer: I really do like both these things, but they aren’t actually in my “Favorite Thing” list, just in my “Really Enjoy” list. 😀 )